Page 48 of King of Hollywood
The funnel cake, not the date.
Though the date was also good. Very good, actually.
Felix ate nothing—even though I offered and even got him his own plastic fork. Instead, he beamed adorably up at me—all boyish good looks, and bubbly excitement. Like he genuinely couldn’t believe how lucky he was to be here. With me. At a carnival, of all places.
No matter what he did, he managed to look out of place, even wearing the new hat I’d bought him, and the t-shirt from the booth. Like there was something off about the way he walked, or talked. He was part of the crowd but separate also. Like I’d plucked him straight out of a time machine from the black and white television era my mother had loved.
Felix’s eyes sparkled.
Like one of those horrible romantic comedies.
He didn’t seem to notice the looks we received as he wandered around, playing games—germ factories, the lot of them, thank God for hand sanitizer—and dodging gaggles of teens and gossiping moms that wore matching running shoes.
Felix was good company.
My first impression of him when we’d gone body dumping had been that he talked too much. But I found now, as he chattered at me about how lovely the rides were—and “oh, gosh, Marshall, look how swell that stuffed dinosaur is!”—that I had been wrong.
He didn’t talk too much.
In fact, I wished he’d talk more.
Every time I tried to pry sneakily into his past he’d casually sidestep the questions. It was fun. Even more fun than the funnel cake and seeing him drenched and sparkling had been.
Which was saying a lot, because…wow.
I didn’t think I’d ever seen anything as pretty as Felix dripping wet, with his blond hair pushed back, and his eyes shining red. Contacts again. I was certain of it. I’d Googled it and I was quite certain that shade could not be natural. It wasn’t as though he could have color changing eyes.
Ha!
What a ridiculous notion.
Almost as ridiculous as the fact that I heard the word vampire muttered at us at least five different times as he wandered through the nosy crowd. I hated everyone here. I hated the noises, the sounds, the lights. I hated the way the smell of popcorn and frying oil cluttered my nose and blocked out the pine needle scent that had drawn me to Beach Town in the first place.
There were a lot of things I hated.
But I didn’t hate Felix Finley.
Maybe I never had.
At one point, I’d paid a good chunk of change so that Felix could play one of the stupid games that populated the fair. It was one of the ones where you had to throw rings over bottles. He was surprisingly good at it, and ended up winning a fat cat stuffed animal that’s eyes were slightly too far apart. He clung to it tight, before ultimately giving it over to me so that he could play more games.
I didn’t even complain, either.
Because he’d been so damn cute, cackling like a maniac as he tossed the rings. I’d been unable to even blink for fear of missing a single moment.
After each game he played, Felix reached over, gently stroking a finger over the cat’s derpy face with a fond smile. He’d tip his head up so he could see me better, and though his eyes were shadowed, blocked by the brim of the baseball cap I’d bought him, they were bright.
I much preferred this cap to the floppy monstrosity he normally wore. Mostly because I could see his ears better.
God, they were cute ears.
I’d never thought that about someone else’s ears before, but at this point I wasn’t surprised.
Felix was my supernova. A phenomenon that was so bright it blinded, but rare enough one may never see one, in all their life.
We stayed till they turned the rides off, and the last dregs of the once thriving crowd began to wander toward the exit gates. Felix and I were one of the last couples left. We lingered at the back as the few remaining guests gathered their belongings, prizes, and leftover popcorn in hand before heading home.
Felix’s hand was cool inside my own—warmer now than it had been when I’d first taken it, almost like he was leeching heat from me rather than exuding his own.